somewhere there's a place for us
by summertimesadness
Summary: AU: Rachel never thought she'd be going this far to make ends meet, but it turns out that the best surprises come in the most unlikely of places. Finchel, one shot.


She's afraid of starting her new job. Normally the wonderfully bright and effervescent Rachel Berry can do anything, but she can't this time. Everyone has always thought that Rachel could do anything, mainly because she could. She can do anything because normally thinks she can – with the exception of this time.

Rachel doesn't know how to sound sexy over the phone; how to play her with her voice to sound like she's coming down from one of the biggest highs of her life, to sound like the only thing she would rather be doing at the moment would be seeing this person face to face, and then actually reaching the moment when she did see him face to face, worrying about how she presented herself and how she acted, hoping she would make enough money to make the rent.

It was never supposed to come down to this, but it did. No thanks to Santana, really. She had said that it was going to pay the bills wonderfully, and it's all Rachel's hoping for. She tries to forget that her dignity will be going down the drain, any sense of self out the window.

Rachel Berry is going to become a call girl, whether she likes it or not.

:.:.:

The first few calls come in slowly; her advertisement not marketed to a main stream audience. Not many New Yorkers want to spent their night with a short Jewish girl who can't stop talking about herself, she learns – they can get that with the wives they want to abandon for one night of debauchery.

She learns a lot of things, actually. Her clientele list grows and she manages her first few jobs, normally not ending in sex. The ones that end in sex still terrify her, but she's an actress. Rachel has managed to perfect lying so that it comes as second nature to her. She walks in, shares a glass of wine, and performs whatever trick they want her to in bed. She's gotten quite good, actually. As time goes on, Rachel's become proud of her abilities to perform on a stranger's mattress.

She hasn't managed to establish any regulars yet. She wonders if Santana can help her at all. You know, drum up business a bit. By no means will she drop to the level of prostitution. That isn't how Rachel Berry operates.

:.:.:

"It's all about the eyes," Santana tells her, shooting the brunette a glance. Rachel adjusts herself on the couch and tries to make the same smolder happen in her eyes, sliding by with her success.

"Like this?" Rachel glances at Santana, causing the Latina to grin.

"Perfect, Berry," she tells her with a sassy smile. "More practice on that and you'll be the hottest little snatch this city has to offer."

Rachel giggles and looks over at Santana with a grin. Six months into this, and she's starting to come into her own. The idea of nearly prostituting herself still doesn't sit well with her morally, but she attracts the upper crust of the city. The men that want her to seduce them wear business suits, work at the Empire State Building. They carry briefcases and have to turn their phones off when she's with them because they're afraid of their wives calling them from the Hamptons.

Sometimes Rachel likes to imagine that she's the real wife of these men, lounging on her bed in Manhattan and dripping in luxuries that she knows she's never be able to afford. She knows that her fathers wouldn't be proud, but it doesn't bother her. She needs the money, and so far, Santana's right. This job pays the bills and leaves her with plenty to spare.

"Do you really think so?" Rachel beams back at the girl with raven hair sitting across from her on the couch, Santana just shooting her a smile.

"Of course. You can be the hot Jew, and I can what everyone wants afterwards. We should advertise as a team. Berry and Lopez, two of a kind." She talks about it like their names will be billed on a Broadway marquee.

Although, if they were, Rachel wouldn't have opposed.

:.:.:

She's realized that she's missed five calls, all from the same number. A curse slips through her lips and she dials the number, holding her phone against her ear nervously. Santana's lectured her on missing calls multiple times, how it's bad for business, etc. That doesn't change the fact that she's still trying to get what she came to the city of hopes and dreams for.

"Hello?" A low voice answers the phone. She adjusts herself like he can see her, making sure her hair looks nice and her clothes lie on her just right. A possible client, she thinks, and she puts her game face on.

"Hi," Rachel coos into the phone. "You called earlier?"

"Yeah, I'm, um, calling for the escort service?" His voice is shaky, his stammering making him sound more adorable over the phone. Rachel smiles a bit to herself, playing with her hair between her fingers.

"Well, you've called the right girl," she says, sitting down on the couch and beginning to relax herself. Her nerves still manage to get the best of her, no matter how long she's had her skin in the game. "What can I do for you, sailor?"

The voice on the other line sounds nervous, Rachel able to hear him. She hopes it isn't a fourteen year old calling her after finding her advertisement in the back of the phone book; she's had the experience before and certainly doesn't wish to have it again.

"I w-was wondering if I could schedule an appointment with you?"

"Anything's fine as long as you're up to it," she says. Rachel's mastered the art of persuasion over the phone to the point where men go weak at the knees when they hear her scheduling their romps in the sack. "What was it you had in mind?"

He asks her if she can meet him and go out to dinner with him, Rachel going into detail about the favors she can perform for him once their behind the closed doors of his apartment. She explains the policies to him as sweetly as she can, but she wants to stop talking for a few moments, just so she can hear this man's voice. It has a soothing quality to it, yet sends her heart racing at the same time. She wants to see his face, hoping it matches the voice she hears.

For her own enjoyment, Rachel pictures Ryan Gosling.

:.:.:

He isn't Ryan Gosling, but he comes awfully close. He must be about seven feet tall, head looking like it scrapes the ceiling. He has arms that she knows he could clearly wrap all the way around her, eyes that are the perfect shade of hazel. He looks like a giant standing there, waiting for her. He's gorgeous either way, dressed in his suit with a long black tie around his neck, his cufflinks and watch even matching.

He's younger than most of her clients, which surprises her. Normally her clients are older because they're rolling in money from the stock exchange. This one can't be a day older than she is. He hasn't made money, he's _from _money.

The girl across the hall makes him think he's died and been to heaven. She's wearinga dress that looks like it belongs on a movie star, although she pulls it off more beautifully than any other girl he's known. She has cat eyes that glimmer as she stares at him, long dark brown hair that cascades down her back in big, loose curls that make his heart swell.

And then her breasts – the one thing he can't keep his eyes off of. He knows how horrible it is to stare, but he can't help it if they're right there in front of them. She can't be upset with him when she puts them on display for him like that.

"Finn Hudson?" She asks coyly, twisting a lock of hair around her finger. He feels his heart beat in his throat, which has gone completely dry.

This is the woman he was on the phone with the other night. This woman who is so unabashed with how she presents herself, who he can already undress with his eyes and fantasize about having sex with.

The best part, he _is_ having sex with her tonight.

:.:.:

He likes how she laughs at his Star Wars jokes over dinner, spending more time smiling at him than eating the salad she's barely touched. He likes how her nose scrunches up on her face and her eyes pinch shut when she giggles, how she looks him straight in the eye when she talks to him. He wants to take her by the hand and walk her around Central Park, to take her over the Brooklyn Bridge and kiss her, to really kiss her. She has to have the most kissable lips he's ever seen, and right now, all he wants is to kiss her. She's beautiful, probably more beautiful than she realizes.

It keeps on slipping his mind that he gets to have sex with her tonight.

:.:.:

She stands in front of him as he sits on the bed, dressed in nothing but her underwear.

"What do you want me to do?" She asks sweetly, walking up to him from the doorway. She straddles him on the bed, Finn feeling his heart race. He looks at her and she tosses her hair over her shoulder, pushing her chest out.

Her breasts are at his eye level, and he finds it hard to keep his cool in front of her.

_Mailman_, he thinks as she pouts and rolls her hips into his. _Mailman, mailman, MAILMAN._

"Do you want to touch me?" She asks, her hand moving up to run her fingers through his hair. Her movements are stiff; rehearsed. "You wouldn't have called for me if you didn't want to touch me." She can feel his erection growing in his pants, a grin slowly curling onto her face.

He doesn't want to, though. He does, like every other twenty five year old man. He finds her attractive and wants to kiss her, his hands aching to touch those breasts that have been staring him straight in the face since dinner. But the way she speaks to him does nothing for him, her movements feeling jerky and unnatural. He wants her to know she's more than just a piece of work to be looked at and touched.

"Can I just hold you?" Finn asks, feeling Rachel come down from her false high.

"Hold me?" Her eyebrows knit together and she stops moving, looking down at him curiously.

"Yeah. Hold you. Will you snuggle with me?" The word is hard to say in front of her, he realizes.

She's moving, however, crawling out of his lap and over on the bed, causing Finn to follow after her. She lies down on his bed and he lays next to her, holding her close to him. She relishes in the feeling of his arms wrapped around her, feeling him pull her close to him. He rests his chin on her head and she giggles, tipping her head back to look at him.

"No one's ever wanted to snuggle with me before. I like it." He smiles at her reuse of his word from earlier, making him feel that he wasn't in the wrong for using it. "You're my first guy that's ever wanted that from me."

"Ever?" The word escapes Finn faster than he wants it to, scaring him a bit. All he wants to do now is forget he said anything and fall through a hole in the floor. Perfect.

Rachel doesn't see why he wants to know about her personal love life. It isn't remarkable, but it isn't one to be shared.

"No…" she says, staying on the word for a few moments. She can't see why he would want to know. All of the other men she's slept with for work just want to know whether or not she would be interested in a threesome. "I've had plenty of men ask me if they'd snuggle with me, I'll have you know. I'm a very desirable person."

"I know you are," he says bashfully. "It's why I want to snuggle with you."

Every time he says the word snuggle, she thinks of the bear pictured on the bottle of laundry detergent, causing her to smile a bit. He sure does look like a bear – a teddy bear, but a bear none the less.

Before Finn knows it, she's asleep in his arms.

:.:.:

Rachel has a job the next afternoon over the lunch hour, which causes her to leave early. She wakes up next to the man from last night, Finn. Finn Hudson, if she remembers correctly. He looks so at peace when he's asleep, making her want to climb back into bed with him and spend the entire day with him. From her impression from the night before, he's simply charming; there's no other words to describe it.

She finds a pad of Post-it notes on his nightstand with a pen and scrawls a message while getting dressed. She sticks it to his forehead before leaving, closing the door behind her.

Her sex that afternoon isn't spectacular, but judging by the fake orgasm she gives the thirty-something businessman, it's the best boning she's had in a long time. She's an actress, she knows how to make someone believe a lie she's told them.

She can't help but think of Snuggle Bear in his apartment, however, still asleep with the Post-it note stuck to his forehead.

:.:.:

Finn wakes up to an empty bed, leaving him a bit surprised. He examines his room and there is no sign of Rachel to be found, his heart sinking. A walk to the bathroom mirror is all it takes for him to realize that she'll be back, however.

_Dear Snuggle Bear,  
>Last night was fun. If you'd like, we can do it again for free of charge. Seeingtouching my boobs is optional – I knew you were staring at them all night.  
>Love, Rachel*<br>P.S: Thanks for the slumber party._

:.:.:

Rachel knows that Santana will kill her if she tells her about Snuggle Bear. What was his name, anyway? Frank? Fred? Finn, she remembers, a smile coming to her face. She sees his face in her head and she can't help but smile. Santana's always told her that she should never form a liking to a client, just because it causes too many problems. She's warned her that unless she wants her heart broken again, forming a relationship with a client should just be considered off limits.

She ignores what Santana tells her, however. No matter how raw her heart is, it tells her to continue to pursue Finn. He's sweet, she realizes, and he would make a marvelous friend no matter what. She doesn't have many friends that are men, she notices – well, men that aren't flaming homosexuals. She's surprised at how many gay guys she's met at bars in the short time that she's been in the business.

Rachel doesn't get any jobs for the night, but Santana's gone, leaving her to stay at home with nothing to do. She pages through the contacts in her phone, finding Finn's number from last night, under the name Snuggle Bear. God forbid Santana ever find her phone.

She waits for him to answer, lying down on the couch as she listens for his response.

"Hello?"

"Hi," Rachel says. "I thought you had forgotten about me."

She can hear him recognize her voice, she hears him smile through the phone. "I could never forget about you," he tells her sweetly. "I got your note from this morning, by the way. He hates that there's a phone between them, desperately wanting to see her again.

"Did you like it?"

"Of course I did," he tells her with a smile. "And I'd like to take you up on your offer you made me." He swallows, feeling a bit nervous as he talks to her. "What do you say we go out on a date, hmm? Just you and me, no fake dinners, nothing. I mean, we can go out to dinner and stuff, but this time it'll be a real date."

She smiles, giggling a bit. "That sounds like fun," she tells him. "I'd like that a lot." Rachel drops the flirtatious tone from her voice and is no longer acting; this is Rachel Berry in her natural being, one that Finn has yet to see. So far, he seems to enjoy the tone of her voice, the way she laughs genuinely into the phone. She aches to see him again, him feeling the same way for her.

"Meet me on the bridge in Central Park tonight, six o'clock," he tells her, smiling. "Dress up, okay?"

"Okay. Where are we going?"

"You'll see," he tells her. "I'll see you later, alright?"

"Whatever you say, Snuggle Bear."

:.:.:

She waits on the bridge, her hands clutching on to the cold stone as she leans over to look out onto the body of water, sighing deeply as she looks for him. He can't be far away; the last time she checked her phone it was six o' clock, just like how he had said. She doesn't worry too much about being stood up; he doesn't seem like the stand-up type. From what she knows of him, he's a gentleman – although not much can be said about the men who hire her out for an hour, anyway. He didn't want sex from her, though – he wanted to spend time with her, which is more that can be said about any other man she's been with.

He runs because he knows he's late. It's not his fault the woman buying tickets in front of him didn't know the first thing about moving in a line, but he can't blame her now. Now he's pushing past tourists and trying to reach Rachel before she leaves, because he doesn't want her to think that he's stood her up. He wonders if she's had that happen to her in the past, and then mentally chastises any man who would dare stand up someone as beautiful as Rachel.

He spots her in an instant, looking more beautiful than he ever thought she could. Her dress is a change from the slink black number she was wearing on their first outing; a shimmering coral that looks to be the texture of paper, fluttering in the breeze. Her hair is thrown into an organized mess on her head, Finn taken aback as she turns to face him. He wasn't able to think that she was able to get any more beautiful than before, but he was wrong.

She walks to him, holding her clutch tight to her chest. He smiles coolly, trying not to stare as he takes her in. He wonders why he hasn't noticed before, but she has legs that go on for miles. For someone who's so short, Rachel has the most beautiful legs he's seen in a long time. It's no wonder she's able to make a living as a call girl – she's got to be the most stunning girl he's seen in his entire life.

"Hi," she says with a smile, the wind taking her hair a bit. He smiles back at her, extending his arm out to give her the bouquet of flowers he's forgotten about.

"These are for you," he says proudly. "I thought you'd be a fan."

Her eyes widen as she notices the pink roses staring her back in the face. "They're beautiful," she gushes, pressing them to her nose. "They smell beautiful, too." She holds them out in front of her, noticing the small tag inside of the plastic covering the flowers.

"Barbra Streisand?"

"Yeah, um, I guess she has her own flowers now," Finn stammers, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. "I thought it was pretty funny, but they're pretty flowers, so I thought you'd like them."

"I love them," she says, her voice sweeter than he's heard it before. "And the fact that Barbra has her name on them makes them even better. I'm quite a fan."

Finn laughs and offers her his hand, which she gladly accepts. "Well, then I think you'll love our date tonight," he tells her, giving her hand a squeeze as they walk through the park. The sun is beginning to set and the lights of Times Square slowly turn on, Finn catching her smile from the corner of his eye.

"Well, I think you'll love what I have planned for us tonight then," he tells her, grinning from ear to ear.

"Why?"

He pulls a hand from the pocket of his jacket, proudly fanning out two tickets in front of her face. Her eyes light up, looking up at him with a smile.

"Two tickets to Evita," he boasts, causing her to giggle. "The best seats in the house."

:.:.:

All he feels are her lips, soft and hot against his own. His fingers tremble slightly against her dress, fingers rough against the smooth fabric of her clothes. She isn't wearing a bra, her breasts puckering beneath his hands. She sighs into his mouth and revels in the moment he has her pressed up against this wall, his mouth slaving over her neck, hands groping for her beneath her dress. It's never been this way before with anyone else. The touches and the kisses and breathy moans are things she's never known to exist, the carefulness and timing of it all.

There are no words exchanged between them, his hands moving down to grab her and sweep her up in his arms, pulling her up to support her and walk her up the stairs. Her giggle fills the stairwell, his eyes trained on hers. She's beautiful, more beautiful than he can imagine.

He throws her on the bed upon reaching his room, territory she's accustomed to, his lips parting from hers, fingers pulling her dress from her head and dropping it to the ground. His fingers dance across her breasts, her middle, her hips, and – _oh._

They turn into an organized cacophony on the mattress, clothes thrown to the ground, bodies tangled in sheets. He moves into her seamlessly and she reciprocates, hands clutching to him, lips moving against his.

After, he pulls her close and she kisses him, watching as he pulls the blanket down on top of them. He wraps his arms around her and he kisses her nose, her smile thanking him. He kisses her neck and she giggles softly, using her small hands against his large ones to pull him close. As she falls asleep in his arms, she can't help but wonder if this is what falling in love feels like.

:.:.:

She walks back to her apartment that morning with a different spring in her step, a perpetual smile on her face. She opens the door to her apartment and Santana is watching Jerry Springer, turning to face her as the door shuts.

"Where were you last night?" Rachel tosses her hair over her shoulder, a haughty look stuck to her face.

"Nowhere," she mutters.

"You had a date last night, didn't you? What, did you finally let some guy other than a paying customer slide his hands all up in your snatch? Congratulations, Berry. You got laid."

Rachel blushes, unable to say anything back to Santana. She doesn't really want to bother, but the way Santana looks at her makes her want to tell her every single detail, from the note belted out by the actress in the role of Evita that she knows should be hers, how he asked her every detail about why she was living in New York, how he knew how to touch her just right in that one spot – it drives her crazy just thinking about it.

"Well, we're going out again on Friday," she tells her, setting her purse down and dropping her keys in the fishbowl. "I'm taking the night off of work and he's taking me to this little cabaret bar he knows of. He said that a lot of important people go there, anyway. Important _Broadway_ people."

Santana just shakes her head, rolling her eyes a bit. This is the girl who will do anything to see her name sparkling above Broadway, why she spends her time with businessmen and lawyers and other big whigs in the city when she could be singing on a stage, having people write reviews about her in the Times and having her name engraved on Tony awards. Santana knows this because she and Rachel have talked about it multiple times – rather, Rachel has, telling her all about the grand plan of moving to New York so she can become the next Barbra, Patti, Bernadette. It's inevitable, she says.

And it kind of is, really. She's heard the brunette sing and she's seen her dance – she can dance circles around every other girl Santana's ever known. She's a bonafide actress as well; Rachel can pretend to be anyone she wants to be for as far as Santana's concerned. There isn't a doubt in Santana's mind that Rachel's name will be in lights someday.

"Well, don't give it up so easily this time," Santana tells her with a smile as Rachel walks into the kitchen. "I always thought you were a prude with a stick up her ass."

"I am not," she protests from the kitchen, but she's unable to wipe the dopey smile off of her face. All she can think of is his voice, his touch, his body. He's perfect in every way, like she was made just for him.

:.:.:

"I don't know, I guess. One second she was telling me all about why she moved here, and the next we were…"

"You were boning her." Puck smiles knowingly at Finn and almost laughs a bit, rolling his eyes. "It sounds like you're in deep shit with this girl. What, did she tell you about all of her 'hopes and dreams' or something?" The co-workers exchange a glance and Finn can't help but smile a bit, thinking back to Rachel's exact words.

"She wants to become a star," he tells Puck, fingering the cuff of his shirt. "She moved here all the way from Ohio. She wants to be on Broadway."

"Is she any good?"

"She didn't tell me," Finn stammered, thinking back to their conversation over dinner from the night before. Puck chuckles and shoots Finn a knowing look.

"She must have sung for you last night if she spent the night." He laughs at his own innuendo and Finn rolls his eyes.

"She's beautiful," he tells his friend, trying to picture her in his head. He can picture her from this morning, lying in bed next to him with her hair mussed around her head, her chest falling and rising as she slept. She looks angelic, like she can't be bothered. She's perfect, and all he wants is to be close to her. He wonders where she is now, one in a city of millions.

He has to find her.

:.:.:

"Hello?"

"Rach? It's me, um, Finn." He chokes on his words and she smiles at the sound of his voice. "What are you up to?"

"I'm getting fitted for a dress, actually," she tells him, her voice low and quieter than usual. He figures that he's interrupted her fitting, wherever she is. "One of my friends from school is getting married, and I'm a bridesmaid. I don't know why I didn't tell you."

He feels his heart skip a beat, grabbing his coffee from his desk. "Where are you?"

"England's Bridal, why?"

"Don't leave. I'll be right there."

Finn springs from his desk and runs to the elevator, Puck watching him the entire time.

Whoever this 'Rachel' girl is, she's taken the balls of his best friend and gone running with them.

:.:.:

No one's ever fallen for her this fast, she's never fallen for anyone this fast. She doesn't know what's come over her, this warm, filling feeling that consumes her each time she's around Finn. They've known each other for about half a week, and yet she feels like she's known him his entire life. She knows of his father that died in Iraq, her biological mother that refuses to maintain any sort of contact with her. He's learned of why she's taken the job she has and how she despises it, having to feign being enamored in the arms of the men of the Upper East Side in order to pay the rent. He asks her if she was that way with him and she tells him the truth.

She never once had to pretend anything when she was with him, all of her feelings genuine. He tells her of his ex-girlfriend who cheated on him in high school, sleeping with one of his best friends – Puck, actually, resulting in an unplanned pregnancy that tore his heart in two. The two boys that have grown into men still manage to maintain a friendship, but Finn explains to Rachel that he doesn't want anything to do with the blonde that rubbed his heart raw so many years ago, to which she responds with a head nod and a sigh.

She's been here too, and it's all too familiar.

She tells him the story of her freshman year of college, of her falling head over heels for the teaching assistant in her Intro to Theatre class. He has a mop of curly brown hair and a smile to match the megawatt one she boasts, and she feels her heart swell for him each time she sings to him. She doesn't feel like he's just listening to her and telling her how she can do better, but listening and plucking each note from the sky and dissecting it, telling her how beautiful her voice is and how he wants to get to know her better. He takes her out for coffee for a week and she melts in his hands, telling him that she's ready for anything he throws at her. She feels like they can take on the world together, and that he's perfect for her. She gives him her virginity in a haste attack, watching her dreams crumble into shambles only days after, when she walks in on him coming onto another young girl in their Intro to Theatre class.

The pain is so devastating that she drops out of school, leaving any possible dream behind in her dorm room. She posts an ad for a roommate and finds that in Santana Lopez, a feisty Latina whose amount of lovers is almost as much as her collection of Amy Winehouse memorabilia. And it brings her to where she is now, a wreck of a girl living from paycheck to paycheck by having someone grope her and tease her for the night and call her 'baby,' even when she knows that she'll never feel the same way.

She tells him how she can feel her heart breaking with each new man in her life, and, for the first time, Rachel Berry cries.

She cries about the men that hit her after she hasn't performed in the way that they want her to, she cries about the men that have pushed the envelope too far once they're with her behind a closed door, she cries about how they've taken things she doesn't even know could be taken from her.

He does his best to hold her and tell her that everything is going to be alright, but he can't assure her that they will. He strokes her hair and presses sweet kisses to her temple, each sob hurting him more and more. He wants to kill this joker that's stolen Rachel's innocence, her womanhood, everything that's right about her. He wants to kill the men that have treated her wrong, slapping sense into them until they finally collapse. He wants her to know that no matter what, he wants to protect her, despite the odds. She's perfect and he's perfect._ They're perfect._

They stand in front of the window display, Rachel's eyes bright as she admires the dress the mannequin is displaying. It's gorgeous; white and flowing with beading and intricate embroideries around the bodice, diamonds sewn into the pounds upon pounds of white tulle that was used to create the skirt.

"It reminds me of you," he tells her, taking her by the hand. "It's beautiful, like you are." She dips her head down to the sidewalk and she blushes, unable to look at him. "You're perfect, Rachel."

:.:.:

He makes love to her that night, her hands rolled into little fists against his chest as he rocks into her, kissing her neck. She screams and he holds her in his arms, kissing her hair.

"Do you think that there's a place for us?" She asks him after a few minutes of silence and breath catching, looking up at him for a moment. "A place where someone like you and I can fall in love and never turn back?"

"I don't care where it is," he tells her, brushing her cheek with his hand. "As long as I have you, I'm perfect. You're my shining star, babe. My sparkling, shining star."

"And you're my snuggle bear," she mumbles into his chest, laughing.

:.:.:

Months go on and she finds a job working at a restaurant. He still works at the large business firm, making more money than she can ever dream of. She pulls her advertisement from the phone book and is no longer a call girl, the biggest smile appearing on her face when the news comes to her by phone. Finn, of course, is the first to know.

"I'm going to do it, baby," she tells him one afternoon as he helps her with her grocery shopping. "One day you're going to wake up and you're going to see my name up on that marquee. Rachel Barbra Berry, in black and white." She pans her hand across the dull New York sky for effect.

"Whatever you say, babe," he tells her, ruffling her hair and smiling a bit. "Just save me tickets for opening night."

:.:.:

His tickets are placed on reserve the first day she can get the order in. It's been exactly three months since their day at the market, and Rachel Berry is starring in the revival of Funny Girl, her opening night days away.

Finn settles into the large house of the theatre, sitting next to Santana, who's beaming with what has to be the biggest smile in the world.

"You know, she was worried you wouldn't be coming. You know how Rachel worries, but she wasn't coming out of the bathroom for this one." Finn laughs and smiles at Santana.

"Well, the show's gotta go… all over the place, right?" Santana chuckles and looks at him knowingly. Somehow, Rachel's picked them right all along.

:.:.:

She waits backstage, staring at herself in the mirror. She finds it hard to recognize herself behind her painted face, but she manages, smiling at her reflection. The glow of the lights bounce off of her face, her smile the brightest thing in the room.

There's a knock on the door, the stage manager ducking in for a few moments with a large bouquet of pink roses in his hand. Rachel rushes to him to accept them, spotting the card buried in the sweet smelling flowers.

_Shining Star,  
>I thought Barbra would be the only one able to wish you good luck.<br>Love, Snuggle Bear.  
>P.S: I'm going to be waiting at the stage door for you when the show ends. Please don't be late.<em>

Rachel smiles and leaves the flowers on the table in her dressing room, recognizing the flowers as she steps onto the stage to belt the first note to open the show.

They're the flowers from their first date.

:.:.:

She rushes outside to see him afterwards, finding it hard to spot him through the throngs of people begging for a picture, flash bulbs popping and people cheering. Her face appears worried, however, trying to find Finn in a sea of thousands.

He calls her name and she finds him, running up to her boyfriend so he can catch her in an embrace. She kisses him wildly and he sets her down, falling down to his knee. His hand reaches into his coat pocket to remove a small box, popping it open and causing it to glitter in the street lights.

She gasps and just nods her head before he has the chance to say anything. She's always known. They'd found their place in the world, finally.


End file.
